Fritz Pollard and early African American professional football players

Brown University and the Black Coaches Association will co-sponsor an annual award honoring Frederick Douglass “Fritz” Pollard of Brown’s Class of 1919. Pollard, the first African American to play in a Rose Bowl Game (for Brown, in 1916) and first to coach in the NFL, was a tireless promoter of integrated rosters in the early days of professional football. (See also news release 03-078)

Frederick Douglass “Fritz” Pollard

Born in 1894 in Rogers Park, Ill., a Chicago Suburb – one
of eight children

Lane Technical High School (1912) 3-year All Cook County halfback, 3 years
on track and baseball teams

Brown University career

1915 season – as a freshman, led Brown to the Rose Bowl
vs. Washington State

First African American to play in Rose Bowl (1916)

In spring 1916, set world record in low hurdles on Brown track team,
qualified for Olympic team

As a theatrical agent, Pollard booked black talent in white clubs in New
York

Tax consultant

Other honors

First African American elected to National College Football Hall of Fame
(1954)

Elected to R.I. Heritage Hall of Fame (1967)

Elected to Brown Athletic Hall of Fame (1971, the inaugural year)

Elected to National Black Hall of Fame (1973)

Honorary Doctor of Letters (LL.D.) conferred by Brown University (1981)

Selected for Brown’s 125th Anniversary All-Time Team (2003)

Pollard died in 1986 at the age of 92.

Early press reports on Fritz Pollard

Dec. 10, 1916
New York TimesGridiron Stars of East Picked“Pollard Wonder of the Year”

In the backfield, one player stands out with unusual prominence.
Spectators in the Yale Bowl, the Harvard Stadium and at Andrews Field in
Providence will not soon forget the remarkable playing of Brown’s negro
back, Fritz Pollard. He is a player of such brilliancy as illumines the gridiron
about every half dozen years. Pollard is a natural football player. He is always
away to flying start, has great speed, and an ability to dodge and squirm
through an open field which is almost uncanny.

The fleet negro revealed this Autumn the resiliency of a rubber
ball. No sooner was he thrown by a tackler than he was up and away again. No
back of the year was able to shake off tacklers as did Pollard. The best of the
season's ends have thrown themselves at him, and their arms have become locked
about his body only to have the elusive runner tear himself loose and gallop
ahead. His was a wonderful change of pace. He could sidestep, dodge and zigzag
as prettily as the best backs the game has seen.

Against Yale and Harvard Pollard's work was nothing short of
thrilling. Once in the Yale game he caught one of LeGore's punts and raced 50
yards through the whole Yale team for a touchdown. At every stage of this
dazzling performance sturdy arms clad in blue yawned for him, but Pollard
trickily shot out of their reach. Tacklers charged him fiercely enough to knock
the wind out of any ordinary individual, but Pollard had the asset which is the
greatest to a football player – he refused to be hurt. It required a
terrific shock to upset him. An ordinary tackle did nothing more than make him
swerve slightly out of his course. In the thick and fury of a football scrimmage
Pollard exhibited the equilibrium of a circus athlete.

Nov. 23, 1932
New York TimesOn College GridironsBy Allison Danzig

The amazingly elusive Pollard, who weighed only 148 pounds, was
the phantom of the gridiron. The shiftiness and speed of this wraithlike figure,
his ability to knife through the narrowest openings and spin out of the clutches
of the enemy, were the talk of the football world.

Dec. 23, 1964
New York TimesSports of The TimesBy Arthur Daley

They stand in the wings, each wondering if he will get the call.
The lucky few will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame at Canton,
Ohio, late next summer. But selection time is almost upon the special committee
of 14 experts who will assemble at the Canton shrine next Monday to evaluate the
most deserving. It will be a titantic job.

Can the committe continue to skip past such vaunted pioneers
from the first-time period as Paddy Driscoll, Benny Friedman, Joe Guyon, Keith
Molesworth and Fritz Pollard, to name only a few?